Even in his sixties, when he was a little stooped and a lifetime of counter-obstetric gravity had begun to nudge his flesh downwards, Mamaji swam thirty
lengths every morning at the pool of the Aurobindo Ashram.

In this case, a 'length' is one trip across the pool -- across the length of the pool.

Animals in the wild lead lives of compulsion and necessity within an unforgiving social hierarchy in an environment where the supply of fear is high and the supply of food low and where
territory must constantly be defended and parasites forever endured.

Note that in chapter 4, Martel is using 'territory' in a number of different ways, for comparison -- both as a political territory added on to a country, and as a habitat for animals (or even people). So it's under both the jurisdiction of a state as well as the jurisdiction of particular species.

Animals in the wild lead lives of compulsion and necessity within an unforgiving
social hierarchy in an environment where the supply of fear is high and the supply of food low and where territory must constantly be defended and parasites forever endured.

That I was a swimmer made no waves; it seems to be a law of human nature that those who live by the sea are
suspicious of swimmers, just as those who live in the mountains are
suspicious of mountain climbers.

One priest was working in his office, his back turned to the bay windows, while the other was seated on a bench at a round table in the large
vestibule that evidently functioned as a room for receiving visitors.

The hill on the right, across the river from the hotel, had a Hindu temple high on its side; the hill in the middle, further away, held up a
mosque; while the hill on the left was crowned with a Christian church.

To speak frankly, many are sexual
deviants, either terribly repressed and subject to explosions of frenzied lasciviousness or openly depraved, in either case regularly affronting management with gross outrages of free sex and incest.

On a scale of 2 to 10, where 2 represents unusual dullness and 10 extreme
acuity, Beebe (1926) gave the sloth’s senses of taste, touch, sight and hearing a rating of 2, and its sense of smell a rating of 3.